The Pearl in the Ash
by Star Fata
Summary: My response to Gadge month prompts on Tumblr- now a story. Madge Undersee dies in the bombing of District 12- and gets up. The Crow flies- and vengeance burns.
1. Crimes

Gadge- Yeah, this got a bit out of hand. Crow!Madge owes more to Flamethrower's Crow!Obi-Wan fic on AO3 than anything else. Part one obviously isn't Gadge. Part two will be coming soon- definitely before the end of February. And I swear it will have Gadge!

Madge didn't know where she was, but it was dark. Dark enough that she couldn't see her hands in front of her face, or see if the place she was in had walls, or simply went on forever.

Given what she last remembered- screaming, a crash and then nothing but heat- she thought it might be the latter.

The Afterlife didn't need walls after all.

She hoped this wasn't it- not forever. She wanted to find her parents, meet her Aunt Maysilee-

No. That wasn't what she wanted. It was what she wanted from the Afterlife, if she wasn't granted oblivion. But what she wanted was beyond her reach now.

She wanted everything they'd taken from her. The sunroom where her piano was kept, afternoon's spent making melodies to songs Katniss had learned from her father. The library, where her father read grim tales and legends that were thought lost if they were thought of at all. Her mother's bedroom, her sickroom in soothing cream and lavender with morphling bottles in a box on the sill.

The woods where she'd been able to think she had friends. The songbird with Aunt Maysilee's pin, quiet and strong like an oak tree, but so brittle in ways she didn't seem to know. The artist with the sharp mind and strongest heart she'd ever seen, caring even when it hurt. The hunter forced to be a miner, burning so fiercely in his desperation and hatred and even his love. Even their trainer, who couldn't look her in the eyes for fear of seeing her aunt, but tried to anyway.

The Capitol had stolen them. Stolen her. She wanted them back but…

"Not as much as you want revenge." A voice crooned, almost in the back of her mind. "Not as much as you want to watch them bleed and burn, hurt them the way they've hurt everyone else."

Madge looked around wildly, but there was only black.

The voice continued. "All those years of keeping your head down, smiling when spoken to, and staying out of the way. They didn't stamp out your fire, only fed the flames. You hate them, the painted and decorated men and women who smile as your people die. Who laugh at the slaughter of children, and think they bestow an honour when they call out the names. You hate beautifully, Madge Undersee."

"It seethes inside of you, but does not devour you. Their words are sparks in the wind, and your obedience ash in your mouth- but between that is the fire. Kept out of sight, never allowed to rage for fear it would consume all that you loved- burning steadily, glowing embers clinging to life for the chance to incinerate all that you despise."

"That which you loved is gone. There is no reason to hold back any longer. Seek that which you hate, the justice that no one will grant your family- and let the fire rage. Let the fury burn."

The darkness changed. Madge drew a breath of air and coughed on old smoke. Her eyes opened to a night time sky- and the ruins of her district. There was no sound except the wind and crumbling building.

Madge stood up- far too easily, she'd never been able to move that way even before the bombs had fallen. She ignored it, stalking towards the nearest pile of rubble- her home. The bodies had been removed- she'd woken up lying next to the half destroyed half rotten corpses, as if still one of them. Mother, Father, Mrs Oberst and Col all lined in a row.

She didn't know what she hoped to find in the rubble until she found it. A simple tin box- dented but not destroyed- and inside were her treasures. A book of music, all her favourite songs noted down in her own hand, and all of the Donner family compositions. A piece of jet her father had bought illegally, paying a coal miner to smuggle it out. Before she'd given it to Katniss, the Mockinjay pin had stayed in this box too.

The last item in the box was the most important at the moment. It had been abirthday present from Haymitch Abernathy when she'd turned ten. Her last year of freedom before she could be reaped.

It was a simple compact, with two mirrors inside. She opened it- and stared.

Her face was covered in grey and black ash, the ashes of her life and her grave. The black spread out around her eyes, like wings. Black wings. Her hair was the same pale gold it had always been, but wild and streaked with the same ash. Her eyes were fever bright against the grey.

In the reflection, she saw black wings against the sky and was therefore unsuprised to feel the weight upon her shoulder.

She turned to face the bird- black feathers, black beak, black eyes. A crow.

"Hello Crow." She said, feeling a dark smile play on her lips. "Do you want to see it burn too?"

The crow cawed in agreement. Her smile grew and she stood, closing the compact and putting it back in the box.

"We'd better get going if they're going to pay for their crimes." Madge thought to herself, placing the box where her body should be. Imaged flashed through her mind. "All of them. Every single bomber and everyone who passed on the order. Including Snow."


	2. Dreams

No one had it easy in the aftermath of the bombings, not even their only female Victor Katniss. So no one even made a note of Gale Hawthorne's restless sleep, deep in the ground that was District Thirteen.

His siblings assumed he dreamt of The Girl on Fire and her many televised scrapes with death. His mother assumed he was unnerved by their own narrow escape from their home- less than a thousand people had escaped the district that was now the tombs of over seven thousand more.

They were both wrong- but each opinion held a kernel of truth. It was dreams that disturbed his sleep, when worry didn't keep him from it. And it was related to someone who didn't escape the Capitol's wrath.

The girl he dreamt of was even on fire. But she was peaches-and-cream where Katniss was olive toned, and her hair was a straight ash blond instead of sooty black curls.

In his dreams, Madge always wore her white reaping dress. Sometimes she was in the sunroom he'd only been in once during the 74th Hunger Games, before Katniss and Peeta became two of the final eight. Those nights she'd sit in front of the piano, hands resting on the keys as if thinking about playing, her head bowed as she waited.

Sometimes she was sitting on her porch steps, knees hugged to her chest in a way she'd never have done in life. There were times she was surrounded by drab grey figures in their old school, and times when she lay down in the forest clearing they'd spent so much time, just looking at the targets.

It always ended in fire.

Tonight was a sunroom night- except Madge was playing this time. Even aware on some level that this was just another dream, another night that would end with Madge Undersee burning away in front of him, he listened. It was familiar, but he couldn't place it.

"Katniss taught me this one." She spoke, her head bowed to the keys. "Do you know it?"

"No." He said, unthinkingly. There was no point in elaborating to a dream, so he didn't mention the sense that the words were on the tip of his tongue, if only he knew where to start.

Madge continued playing. "You'll have to ask her for the words then. I wrote them in the book, but I can't remember them."

"The book?" He repeated, taking a step forward. Madge and her piano were no closer for it.

"Where my grave was." The beautiful dead girl answered, not even turning her head as her fingers moved across the keys. "I hope someone finds it. It's all that's left of the Donners now."

"And the Mockinjay Pin." Gale added, taking another step forward. Once again, there was no effect.

"No. The Mockinjay belongs to Katniss." Madge stated firmly, the melody under her hands beginning to repeat itself. "Symbol of rebellion and songbird both."

Gale kept walking forward, but he never moved closer. Madge fell silent, except for that hauntingly familiar melody.

This time when the song ran its course, she shut the lid of the piano with a sense of finality. "There won't be any songs for me now." She said, not quite sadly. It wasn't resigned either, but it wasn't happy.

"What, no piano's where you are?" Gale asked, barely paying attention to the familiar movements of his legs.

"I'm sure I could find one, somewhere." Madge assured him, standing from her piano stool easily. "But that's not what I'm here for."

She turned to face him and he froze in shock. Her face was coated so thickly in grey ash that he couldn't see her skin underneath it, and the area surrounding her closed eyes was a thick black in the shape of outstretched wings.

"Then," Gale began, swallowing nervously. "Then what are you here for?"

The smile on her lips should have been bittersweet, but the dust turned it into something sharp and terrifying.

"Tonight, I'm here to warn you." Her eyes opened a crack.

He was still frozen where he stood, so very far from the girl in the pretty dress with the ash-covered face.

"You always burned so fiercely Gale Hawthorne." The girl mused (not Madge, not Madge Undersee who occasionally overpaid for strawberries and stared him down coolly, her every soft-spoken word spent more carefully than coin). "But you don't know how to use it. You survive on hate for the people who've hurt you and love for those who depend on you and passion for the cause you've found. What are you going to do when this is over, and you're left standing in the burned out ruin of your life? When the people you hate are beyond your reach, your family no longer need you to put food on the table, the rebellion becomes a thing of history books?"

He stares at her blankly, not sure what he can say or even where to start with it.

She hangs her head. "I was afraid of that. Be careful Gale Hawthorne, only one of us need burn." Her eyes snap open and Gale recoils- her eyes now fiery in every sense of the word. "I would hate for you to follow this path after me."

He opens his mouth to scream in horror or denial as the room catches fire, the flames racing across every surface- the floor, the walls, the ceiling, the windows- until there's nothing but the inferno, and the girl is only a black silhouette in the flickering light, a girl then a bird and then gone.

He wakes up screaming.

* * *

The song is Hanging Tree- I had Adriana Figueroa on repeat while writing this.


	3. Bread

Prompt March 2014- Bread/Posy

* * *

A whirl of dramatic white and black should have been out of place on the kaleidoscopic Capitol Streets- but the black make up spread thickly around her eyes and the feathers in her hair kept her from being anything other than a daring fashion fad, shunning the colours that others favoured. The girl was young, probably experimenting with monochrome. It wasn't uncommon. No one paid any attention beyond the first glance.

The girl stepped into the store with a slight spring in her step, as if she'd been looking forward to this all day. As if she had every right to be there.

Thankfully, it was empty. She stepped up to the cashier with ease, drawing her Identity Card to pay for her purchase.

"Strawberry bread." She smiled. "Two slices."

Bread acquired, she left the shop with a whish of her skirts. No one looked at her twice, and thus no one noticed when she abruptly vanished into the shadows.

"Did you see enough?" She enquired pleasantly when she reappeared in the forests, crumbling one piece of bread in her hand. She held it up to the Crow that landed on her shoulder.

The Crow, who she'd taken to calling Grip, cawed in affirmation, before helping itself to the bread. The girl who had once been Madge Undersee frowned at her own piece. She'd only had strawberry bread once, for her fifteenth birthday. Her father had taken the strawberries bought from Katniss and Gale, given them to the Mellarks and told them what they wanted. Peeta had delivered it personally, a small smile on his face as he'd wished her a happy birthday.

It had been sweet, but it had been bread, albeit bread with chunks of strawberry in it. Nothing like this strange Capitol creation- was there anything they wouldn't alter? It was definitely some sort of baked item, although more like cake than any loaf of bread she'd ever seen. It was a soft pink all the way though.

Taking a bite, she scowled. The bakers in the Capitol were one of the few things she could say with certainty were inferior. Doing her best to ignore it, she ran over the information Grip had given her.

"We'll take care of them tonight." She told Grip, who just cocked his head at her. "And then we find the next one on the list. We'd best wait until late though, we don't need to kill the children."

It was good fortune to have two of her enemies in the same house, married even. She had expected she'd have to go through the list one by one, hopefully before the Rebellion killed off too many of them.

Thirteen down, only ten more to go. And then Snow.


	4. Promise

This is for an April Prompt for Gadge month- Promise

* * *

Sometimes, Madge catches glimpses her reflection. In the glass panes of the city and the shiny metal that is as common as the concrete under her feet. In the mirrors of the homes of the murderers she's hunting.

It's not something she's spent much time on, except to check that she passes muster as a Capitol Girl. That there's no sign of blood or ashes on her face.

It's as she's waiting for the last bomber, settled into a hotel room that is marked as empty for the night, that she finds the time to look, really look at herself.

Her face is bare, and she studies her features, looking for some sign of change. She still looks like her mother- a washed out golden girl, frail and uninteresting. A true Townie. There's something of her father in the shape of her eyes, and in the curve of her mouth- dozens of tiny little pieces that make her look like her mother, instead of her mother born again.

There should be a sign somehow. Of her death, of the things she's done and the total lack of regret for those things- but all she can see is herself. Good old Madge Undersee, same as always.

Grip flies to her shoulder, and Madge reaches up to pet the raven. She keeps watching her reflection, even as the ashes coat her skin.

"Hey there Grip." Madge quirks a smile. "Don't suppose you could do me a favour next time you fly between?"

The raven- the crow, the pyschopomp, her guide in this life and to the next- tilts his head. Considering, watching, waiting.

She wets her lips, out of memory for the nerves she should feel. "Tell them I only have a few more to go. That I'll be there soon. I promise."

Grip keeps watching and waiting- even as the target finally arrives in the secure hotel room next door, to wait in protective custody for her. Mells Redyna thinks that she is waiting for the peacekeepers to catch the killer- the murderer of all those poor men and women who were just following orders and doing their jobs when they lay waste to District Twelve.

Mells Redyna is a fool- but a sharp one. She's been the hardest to find of the grunts, not solely due to the Peacekeepers either. She'd been the one to realise what the 'victims' had in common. Self-preservation is truly a wondrous thing- but Madge is dead. She doesn't need to avoid the bullets, she just needs to get passed the gunmen to the woman they're guarding.

After Mells is dead, and her guards with her, Grip lets out a caw and nods decisively. He's agreed to her request- he'll pass on the message when he gets a chance. Madge smiles brightly at him, even as they make their escape and consider their next target.

There's not many left now.


	5. Order

Order- April 2014

* * *

District Thirteen runs like a machine- everyone has their place in line, a duty, and they all know the consequences of stepping out of place. It would rankle- but unlike in District Twelve, this particular form of order is necessary. Space and food aren't scarce by any means, but there's not a lot of excess either.

If those rules didn't exist, Gale would have placed money on District Thirteen being just as run down and hopeless as Twelve had been. There's purpose in this order, rather than fear and despair.

That said, despite being 'the Mockingjay's Best Friend', Gale is fairly low on the information ladder- not quite the bottom rung, but not too far off of it. So when the rumours start flying about a serial killer in the Capitol, they take a while to reach him.

At first, they don't mean much, except that he's glad someone's killing the bastards. Even if it is probably one of their own, it's still dead Capitol people.

Then the rumours take a different tone- almost shocked, incredulous and a little hopeful all at once. They say that the dead are the ones who destroyed District Twelve. The second that a District Twelve refugee had heard the new rumours, the tale spreads like fire.

Someone's avenging District Twelve. The dead, left to rot in the streets while they sought for survivors, would not have their murderers live free.

Gale is never sure what he feels about this information- if it's even true. He knows enough about propaganda that he's not going to believe anything he hears third hand.

So he follows the story as details filter down, and carries on with his life. Working with the rebellion, keeping Katniss sane, and looking out for his family. And then, one day, he receives an order to report to a tiny office room, not too far from what he thinks of as 'Rebel HQ'.

When he gets there, they explain. Of hundreds of refugees from Twelve, there are three that have clearance to know what they're going to tell him. Katniss is unofficially considered both too volatile and too vulnerable to see this, while Haymitch has better things to do, and was too isolated from his District, being a Victor in Victor's Village for twenty five years to be able to offer any information.

They have footage of the killer he's been hearing about. They want him to see if he can see anything, as a District Twelve boy rather than one of Thirteen's analysts. Gale, fool that he is, agrees.

He knows his place- and he's got nothing to gain by refusing.

The footage is grainy compared to the Hunger Games footage, the light dull. There's three plain blank doors in a hallway. The time in the bottom right corner is speeding forward, he watches as a woman and what appears to be a security team march into the one in the middle, moving like bizarre marionettes under the speed.

The analyst turns off the fast forward, seconds before the door furthest from the camera opens. The Killer steps out- and it's a girl. He's so shocked by the slender form in the dark dress that he almost forgets to look.

"Townie." He says immediately- no seam girl walked that way, one foot almost directly in front of the other, like Effie Trinket did when she was escorting tributes.

He can't see the girl's face- she keeps it held low, and the bird on her shoulder hides- wait, bird? Yes, there is a bird on her shoulder. The camera can't seem to focus on it, it's flickering in and out of sight. When it's there, it hides what little would be visible of her face.

When it isn't, he can see some sort of face paint. His gut churns as he tries to see what the design is, but the bird flickers too quickly.

"Hair's fancy." He says, instead of mentioning the paint. They've all seen the video before, it's pretty obvious they haven't brought him here to say what they already know. "Vein-braids are for toastings, but they should meet in the middle of the back of her head. Those don't."

And what does that say about the girl, that the sign of two lives and families meeting is left undone? Mourning braids. No future, the past left unfinished. He feels a surge of empathy for her- especially when he sees that not only do the braids not meet and become intertwined, her hair is completely loose at the back. He doesn't have words for that kind of braid- and wonders if she does.

The way she pushes her shoulders back as she reaches for the handle, almost dislodging the bird, rings a bell. But that's impossible- the girl who did that is dead, left to rot under coal dust and open skies.

He knows the order of the world even better than he does the order of District 13- there are no miracles, no second chances, just tragedies and those lucky enough to avoid them when they can. Madge Undersee is dead- she'll never eat strawberries, or straighten up before opening a door, or play her piano ever again.

The quiet, serious girl is dead, and wouldn't have been a killer if she had lived. She'd been the pampered Mayor's daughter, entertaining the Capitol with her family every year she'd been alive. She wasn't a murderer.

(In the back of his mind, Haymitch laughs bitterly. _The Capitol makes us all killers.)_


End file.
